Today, college is typically viewed as an integral part of obtaining a quality career and achieving long-term economic success. Thanks to this outlook, a great weight is put on getting into the best post-secondary educational institutions. While there are many issues with colleges and the current perception of them, this blog and post will focus on the public-school system and its impact on college placement, respectively. While performance within the public schools plays a major role, the quality of the schools has a large effect on college placement in a variety of manners.

 

In an earlier post, Niche was brought up. One of the many statistics it ranked schools by was college preparation. This statistic is calculated based on a variety of other factors, ranging from SAT scores to basic proficiencies in certain areas. Ultimately, it is trying to assess how ready a certain school prepares its students for college. One factor is past college placement. It accounts for what universities past students attended to determine the level of higher education the school’s students were prepared for in the past. Basically, it is attempting to paint a picture of where students might go afterwards, depending on how well their high school has prepared them.

 

Admission Factor Weights – Photo Credit

 

As mentioned earlier, there are many aspects of a high school education that affect college preparation. Of these, the quality of the school’s academics is one of the most impactful. Just browsing Niche, it quickly becomes evident that the schools with better academics are the institutions with better college preparation. This quality of education is measured by SAT scores and reading and math proficiencies. Essentially, the three things go hand in hand. They all rise and decline together as they are components or measures of one another. It would make sense that the test scores of a school that has a good education would rise and that same school would better prepare its students for college. The students coming from schools with greater college preparation typically get into better colleges thanks to their better preparation for what comes next.

 

GPA and ACT/SAT Acceptance Rates – Photo Credit

 

So, what is it that these better high schools offer to have better college preparation? One major offering of these better schools is AP classes, or Advanced Placement classes. These advanced classes are usually taken in high school and culminate in a standardized test that is administered by College Board. If a student does well enough on the assessment, they can then get college credit. The college would have to be willing to accept this credit and most do. These classes are an excellent way for students to prepare for college. They allow students to get a taste of the rigor that college will bring. Additionally, these difficult classes are something that college admissions staff look for in that it shows that the student is ready for college. While AP classes are a great resource for students, not all public schools are able to offer them to their students, making it difficult for their students to compete with their counterparts at better schools.

 

This may appear obvious, but SAT scores play a major role in college placement. They carry a significant weight in that the standardized test is meant to assess college readiness. A high score on the SAT will improve any students’ chances at getting into their dream school. Consequently, a low score could inhibit a student from getting into college altogether. Seeing as this test can have a drastic influence on college acceptance, SAT preparation is an excellent way for students to ready themselves for the exam. College Board (image too) itself has acknowledged that preparation can raise scores significantly. Just taking the PSAT, practice SAT, can raise scores by 60 points. Sadly, like AP classes, SAT prep and the PSAT is only offered at certain high schools. These are then the schools that receive better education and college prep scores.

 

SAT Improvement from PSAT – Photo Credit

 

When looking at students, college admissions look at many aspects. They will always try to look at the student as a whole, but their transcript and SAT score will play a major part in this. At just about any college, the acceptance rate rises as the SAT score and GPA go up. In trying to look at the students as a whole, the difficulty of the courses taken by the student also plays a role in acceptance. Despite trying to account for the difficulties of students coming from bad school districts, the students coming from school districts with better college preparation usually fair better when it comes to college placement. Moving forward, the best manner to level the playing field would be to offer the necessary college preparation resources at all schools, but it is unlikely that this level of fairness would ever be achieved.

Whether you like it or not, standardized testing is everywhere. Most colleges require either SAT or ACT scores when determining acceptance. Additionally, many public schools have their students take standardized tests to assess proficiency in certain areas. The aim of these test is to measure student achievement on a large scale. While the tests often fail to meet this requirement, the goal is to make the tests reliable and objective assessments of student ability. While this model may work in a perfect world, our world is far from perfect.

 

Students Talking a Standardized Test – Photo Credit

 

Firstly, let’s address the implications of the tests. Public schools throughout the United States receive funding from the federal, state, and local government. As you can imagine, this system can be quite complicated. For the purposes of this specific post the only necessary information is that many sources of funding take the requirements of grants or come with certain requirements. In most cases Public Schools need to take standardized testing to receive any funding at all. Furthermore, public schools need to meet certain benchmarks or show a certain level of improvement to receive funding from these sources. Yes, a sizable portion of funding boils down to the test scores of students. This idea can be painful when the teachers are limited in what they can do to make their pupils grasp the importance of the exam and succeed.

 

As usual, this aspect of the educational system can be viewed as broken in several ways. Aside from the fact that tests are used to decide funding, a prominent issue is the manner in which the schools with the higher scores receive more funding. This may seem fair in that the best schools should be awarded the most money. However, this logic breaks down when you view the schools in terms of need, meaning the schools that are testing poorly need more money due to their academic short-comings. They need more money in order to better their educational institution and teach more effectively. Of course there are failures in this logic too, but cutting the funding of schools that are failing doesn’t appear to be an effective solution either.

 

Parent Perceptions of Standardized Testing – Photo Credit

 

Again, the SAT and ACT are two of the most obvious examples of standardized test and for good reason. Just about every student applying to a post-secondary school will take one of the two at some point. Whether you like it or not, these tests play a major role in the application process. With the millions of students applying to colleges each year there needs to be some way to standardize application. A test is an excellent method for this and it is a good idea at hear. Yet, a single test score can never properly represent who a student or their potential. This leads many students to resent the practice, finding the implications of just one test to be too great.

 

SAT Test – Photo Credit

 

Building on this foundation are the many problems with the test. The exam is meant to predict first-year success of students in college, but many studies have found the tests to be inaccurate in some manner or another. Herman Aguinis, a lead researcher, has found that the SAT score both over and under predict the performance of students. This was not just a couple of cases, it was inaccurate nearly one fifth of the time.

 

Still, the more important issue is the test’s several biases . A New York Times article expressed that, “On average historically, whites and Asians do better than blacks and Hispanics on the SAT; wealthier children do better than poorer ones; and boys do better than girls — slightly better in verbal skills and considerably better in math.” Efforts have been made to reduce these biases in recent years, but they have persisted. Unfair questions were the root of the problem in the past, which primarily entailed topics that were more familiar to some students. The more recent efforts have lessened the gap, but it still exists. The testing companies claim that the root of the problem is not the test, but stereotypes and greater societal problems. Assuming this is the case, hopefully a true resolution can be found.

 

SAT Racial Bias – Photo Credit

 

It is more than likely that standardized tests are not going anywhere anytime soon. They will continue to a source of conclusions for the foreseeable future. For that reason, we must attempt to draw meaningful insights from them. We must avoid placing too much weight on them and assessing them in terms of our current social system.

 

 

From the intercity of Detroit to the rural farmland of Missouri, children all over the United States share one common requirement. They must attend school. Most students groan at the idea of having to go to school every day, failing to see the importance of an education. However, upon reflection most people will be able to appreciate the impact it had on them. Similar to the cluelessness of its importance, many students are completely unaware of the disparity within the overall education system. They have no idea that the education they are receiving is completely different from their counterparts in another town, county, or state.

 

Students Walking to Class – Photo Credit

 

This begs the question; how different can they really be? There are several websites such as Niche, where the sole purpose is to compare school districts and document the differences. After just a brief look, it becomes evident how different these schools can be. The top-rated traditional public school in America is Stuyvesant High School, located in New York City. It graduates 99% of its students, boasts an average SAT score of 1470, and has a 99% proficiency in both reading and math. Meanwhile, one of the many public high schools on the bottom of the list was Butler High School, from Augusta, Georgia. Here, only 67% of the students graduate, the average SAT is 930, and the school is 8% proficient at reading and 5% proficient at math. The difference is as apparent as it is astounding. When looking at the two side by side, it is hard to believe the two public high schools can be that different.

 

The Highest Rated Public High School in the Nation – Photo Credit

 

Of course, these results are multi-factorial. There are many elements that go into the education of a student. “The Factors Effecting Student Achievement,” by Engin Karadag, outlines some of the many factors that can impact student achievement. As you probably guessed, the quality of the school and teacher qualifications play a significant role in student education. A study completed by Berkley students, entitled “The contributions of school quality and teacher qualifications to student performance: Evidence from a natural experiment in Beijing middle schools,“ found that increasing the quality of the teacher pool resulted in an average increase in student scores. This report, in addition to the many similar studies that reinforced it, stress the theme that the school and teacher quality effect education. Still, even these reports acknowledge that there are many other factors.

 

Of the many factors that exist, socio-economic status is one of the most prominent. This is because it is an underlying factor that affects many other issues which are on the surface. For example, one widely accepted fact is that schools in low-income areas are frequently worse. This is because less money is generated by the area for the education system. This lack of funding is then translated into schools that lack updated materials and facilities. These educational institutions are often unable to bring in quality teachers because they are drawn in by the schools with better funding, seeing as they can offer higher salaries and better working conditions.

 

An Illinois School in an Impoverished Area – Photo Credit

 

Moreover, there are many psychological factors that can impact students. Overtime, the low-quality education institutions have failed many students reinforcing a positive feedback loop in which the students are not expected to succeed. Knowing these expectations, the students frequently give in to the downward trend of the schools, resulting in both their own failure as well as that of the schools. Often, these trends occur in low-income areas where the schools are not getting enough funding to start with.

 

While a failing education system should be important in and of itself, the issue reaches beyond just education. Many studies have displayed that there is a positive correlation between financial success and level of education. Meaning that the children who are unable to get an excellent education will most likely fail to find fiscal success. This can have a cyclical effect in low-income areas which are unable to support their education systems properly. While this may not have been how the issue started, it has not and will not be helpful in its resolution moving forward.

 

Education, Employment, and Earnings – Photo Credit

 

Overall, the purpose of this blog is to explore our current education system. This includes searching for the root of the problem, researching the impacts, and investigating possible solutions. While this blog may not have a direct impact on anything, education is the first step.